AUTOMATIC SPEAKING AND WRITING, 1905

We propose to start from the assumption that Automatic Speaking and Writing are ascertained facts…. The first great problem to be solved is — Who, or what, is the intelligence at the back of the phenomena?

(Edward T. Bennett, Automatic Speaking and Writing).

As the Society of Psychical Research went on to figure out spiritualist tricks and expose many mediums as frauds while actually trying to prove spiritualism, they became increasingly focused on automatic writing. The independent act could be replicated and observed under any circumstances and was one of the best forms of evidence left that they had yet to disprove. Edward T. Bennet (1831-1908), a botanist and an prominent member of the SPR, put together a collection of research, Automatic Speaking and Writing: A Study, in 1905. The book divides automatic speaking and writing into three types, and proceeds to give case studies of each:

1. Those in which definite facts are stated, or in which information is conveyed, unknown by any normal means to the automatist.

2. Those in which the intelligence claims to give evidence of its identity with a deceased person.

3. Those as to which the principal interest consists in the character of the communications. (Edward T. Bennett, Automatic Speaking and Writing)